Retailers Offer Apps With a Catalog Feel

"It’s a reasonable facsimile of doing a little window shopping and maybe you stop in somewhere and get something that piques your fancy,” she said, like the blue silk Phillip Lim blouse she recently bought on the Net-a-Porter.com iPad app.

Shopping on the iPad is more convenient than using her laptop in bed, Ms. Sara said, and easier than scrolling through tiny images on her phone while waiting in the car for her children.

“It’s greatly enhanced my kind of depressing soccer mom life,” she said.

Shopping, as old-timers may remember, was once fun.

Then Google came along, and afternoons spent wandering past store windows, or flipping through catalogs, were often condensed into two-minute searches for “jeans 32 waist dark wash -bootcut -stretch city fit”

Now, though, retailers like Net-a-Porter think they have found a way to give online shopping more of the feel of an outing at the mall or an hour with a catalog — by creating apps that resemble magazines for tablet computers. Just as magazine publishers are producing iPad apps that mimic print in a way they never could on ordinary Web sites, retailers are making iPad catalogs, with big, stylized photographs that users can flip through on the couch or in bed. And also like magazine publishers, they are adding rich features like video, sound and 3-D views.

Though most retailers started with the iPad, some are starting to build versions for other tablets. EBay, for instance, is building Android tablet apps and a new version of its Web site designed for tablets. Others, like Blue Nile, the online diamond retailer, are taking a different approach, constructing tablet versions of their Web sites instead of apps on the theory that most traffic still comes through Web searches.

The idea is to offer “shop-ertainment,” said Siva Kumar, chief executive of TheFind, a shopping search engine that last week introduced Catalogue, a tablet app that pulls together interactive catalogs from about 30 retailers including Crate & Barrel and Sephora.

Traditional retailers like Sears and Ralph Lauren, along with e-commerce focused companies like Amazon, Gilt, QVC, HSN and eBay have all introduced tablet apps.

Many retailers say they see a lucrative future in tablet shopping because even though tablets made up only about 4.4 percent of all computers shipped in 2010, according to Morgan Stanley, they are expected to make up about 20 percent within two years. And iPad owners, who tend to be affluent given the $499 price tag for the device, already prefer not only browsing but also buying from a retailer’s app rather than the Web site in some cases.

At Net-a-Porter, for example, about 15 percent of shoppers buy from the iPad app, while eBay says the average purchase amount through its iPad app is higher than through either its Web site or through mobile phones. Meanwhile, Blue Nile executives say they expect iPad shopping to outpace Web shopping at some point.

Retailers also see the tablet as a more appealing backdrop for presenting their goods. On a computer, anyone can put up a Web site and compete with an established retailer. But on a tablet, big retailers have the deep pockets and development skills to set up eye-catching features and also add the ability to drop an item in a cart with a quick drag of a finger.

It is also easier than on a phone, say, to swipe to the next image or zoom in on a hemline. And the image and video quality are often better than on either phones or computers.

At the same time, tablets allow retailers to fix what many think went wrong for them online, when search engines made shopping all about the price, rather than about the store. In the new apps, retailers edit their merchandise, focusing on just a few top items. This is meant to appeal to shoppers who might be overwhelmed by the pages of search results they see on a computer. Because it is about presentation and selection rather than price, it gets the stores out of the low-price game that many are forced to play online, and back into being fashion arbiters.

“The iPad app is really our magazine app,” said Alison Loehnis, vice president of sales and marketing for Net-a-Porter. Its app was introduced last summer, and has been downloaded 120,000 times.

“Our site was founded on the desire to create a fashion magazine that you can shop from, and this whole notion of literally being able to move things around on the page and slide things into a shopping basket and touch things with your fingers the way you would do in a magazine is really a dream come true,” Ms. Loehnis said.

EBay, which had an iPad app ready to go the day that Apple introduced the tablet, also set it up for leisure time.

“We speculated, along with some input from Apple, that people would use the iPad like a book or a magazine, so the idea was a comfy chair, the couch, the bed, where a laptop doesn’t work very well,” said Steve Yankovich, vice president of eBay Mobile.

At Gilt, a flash-sale site, the iPad app “truly is sort of an entertainment source during the member’s downtime” said the company’s chief product officer, Stefan Pepe.

Gilt’s sales start at a specific time, and it has a limited amount of merchandise, and so its Web site and iPhone app are geared toward quick shopping. Although Gilt members shop flash sales on the iPad app, they can also use it to look at clothes as they would in a fashion magazine — a different experience. Shoppers can zoom in on the images closely enough to see the stitching on a shoulder seam or the lace fringe on the bottom of a skirt, for instance, and can drag items to their shopping carts without leaving the page.

Amazon’s tablet app, Windowshop, is also heavily visual, showing rows of images with tiny bits of text beneath them, and that seems to draw customers in, said Sam Hall, director of mobile for Amazon.com.

“The thing that customers have commented on is there’s this area of serendipity,” Mr. Hall said. “Windowshop looks so different from other shopping experiences, and we show you so many images at once, that you find yourself five minutes later looking at something that you had no intention of looking at originally.”

In TheFind’s Catalogue, a shopper can see the typical catalog-style shots, like of a living room filled with Crate & Barrel furniture, or can view individual photographs and descriptions of each item in the shot, like the pillows or lamps.

Mr. Kumar of TheFind said the app was a reaction, in part, to the overwhelming shopping options available online.

“If I said, let’s show you every possible shoe on the planet, you’d be exhausted,” Mr. Kumar said. “A lot of these retailers use the catalog to tell people what they have: it’s things they’ve curated and picked.”

Retailers have also noticed that consumers use tablets as a way to relax. And that’s good for them. As Mr. Yankovich of eBay said, most transactions on the company’s iPad app take place from 5 to 11 p.m.

“People are decompressing after work, maybe had a few cocktails,” he said. “That’s beautiful, we like that, it’s good for shopping.”

-Jim Wilson/The New York Times, STEPHANIE CLIFFORD and CLAIRE CAIN MILLER

Google announces mobile payment system: Google Wallet

Are you ready to pay for everything via your smartphone? Google is the latest tech company banking on it. At a packed press event in New York, the search giant launched Google Wallet, a method to pay for goods via your smartphone. Google also unveiled a separate initiative, Google Offers, for mobile coupons, working with partners such as Citi, MasterCard, First Data and Sprint, as well as merchants that include Subway, Macy's, Walgreens and American Eagle. Google says it is building an open solution to other financial companies and retailers.

"Your phone will be your wallet — just tap, pay and save," says Stephanie Tilenius, vice president of commerce at Google. Adds Osama Bedier, vice president of payments at Google, "This is just the beginning. We plan to push the limit and innovate in that space."

Google isn't the only one at it, of course. The Google announcement follows word that Square, a company headed by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, will also pursue mobile contact-less payments.

For mobile payments to take off, consumer behavior will have to change. But Google points out that while a decade ago 70% of consumers were reluctant to pay for stuff online, today 70% access their credit card information over the Internet. At the start, a Google Wallet will give access to a Citi MasterCard. But it will also include a prepaid Google card that can be funded by any of your credit cards. Google also says it is addressing security with multiple layers of security. "It was a fundamental consideration from day one," Bedier says.

Citi's Paul Galant says this is of "strategic importance" to Citi in its vision to become "the world's digital bank."

Google has other motivations. "Google's interest here isn't in the payments, it's in the data that underlies the complete chain of commerce including consideration, promotion, transaction details, coupons and receipts," noted Forrester mobile analyst Charles Golvin in an e-mail.

Google will begin initial testing of Google Wallet in New York and San Francisco. To start, Google Wallet will be compatible with Nexus S 4G by Google, available on Sprint.

The Associated Press notes that the ambitious plan to transform how consumers pay faces several hurdles, including its initial availability on just the Nexus S. It will connect only to MasterCard PayPass terminals. There are more than 135,000 of those in U.S. stores and restaurants, but that's only a small fraction of the total number, notes the AP.

At the presentation on Thursday, Google executives said the company would be open to partnering with other tech companies including Microsoft, RIM or Apple.

NFC, for Near Field Communications, is the short-term wireless technology built into a phone that helps make contact-less payments happen. Google noted that by year-end there will be many NFC-enabled phones on the market.

-USA Today

428 Million Mobile Devices Sold In Q1 2011, 19% Increase Year-Over-Year

In Gartner’s latest mobile market report, the research firm indicated that over 428 million mobile devices were sold in Q1 of this year, representing a solid 19% year-over-year increase.

As usual, the growth is attributed to the continued spike in smartphone sales – which Gartner pegs at 100.7 million for Q1, up 85% year-over-year. Android remained the top dog, which soared past Symbian to capture 36% of the market. Nokia’s Symbian is in second place with 27.4%, followed by Apple’s iOS with 16.8%, RIM’s BlackBerry with 12.9% and Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 with 3.6%.

The difference between Android and Symbian is significant given the fact that, at the end of 2010, the roles were completely reversed. Symbian held 37.4% of the market while Android was far behind with 22.7%.

In terms of device manufacturers, Nokia still holds first place with 25.1% mobile devices sold, a large drop from the 30.6% share the company held in Q1 2010. Nokia’s market share will likely keep plummeting at least until the company starts selling Windows Phone 7-based devices, which is supposed to happen in 2012. Meanwhile, Samsung holds second place with 16.1% of the market, followed by LG, Apple, RIM and other companies whose market share is lower than 3%.

Looking forward, Gartner predicts that worldwide smartphone sales will reach 468 million units in 2011, with Android taking 38.5% of the smartphone market. The way Android has been growing like wildfire, I’d say the prediction is accurate, if not conservative.

-Mobile Marketing Watch

How To Get Mobile Numbers For Bulk SMS Marketing

The problem exists for many. You fancy getting into SMS marketing but you haven’t got any mobile numbers, [therefore you have] nobody to send a message to. So where do you start?

Ultimately you want a list of followers who are genuinely interested in your product or service. People who are happy to receive your message and are likely to buy your goods.

It’s called permission-based marketing, loads of books have been written on the subject, [including offerings by Benjamin DeLeon, President of Brandel, Inc and its marketing website, AdKing.com.

You will want to follow this advice:]

First and foremost; never, ever part with money for a list of mobile numbers. Purchasing a list of mobile numbers and then firing out messages is regarded as SPAM.

You won’t win many friends this way and you will upset a lot of people. Expect to receive responses containing a range of four letter swear words; and don’t expect to get any new customers.

I’ll give you an example, we know a charity who bought 40,000 numbers.

With a modest 1% response rate you might expect 400 new donors. But, no, they got ONE. That’s right ONE.

And complaints, they got thousands. Messages like, “Where did you get my mobile number?” and “Do not send me anymore SMS, ever!”

They also got complaints via phone as well, some of the recipients rang their network providers and complained, who in turn spoke to the charity. Dealing with the fall out was messy; don’t fall into the same trap.

The short and long is this: no one wants a text message from someone they don’t know. No matter whom you are or how cool your offer is, they don’t want it. End of story.

Put a notice up.

This is simple method number one.

Signup for some SMS marketing software [go to AdKing.com for options] and then put a sign up — nothing fancy, just print something on a sheet of [paper] asking people to subscribe to get free stuff, offers, promotions, or whatever it is you are going to send them via SMS. Something like:

To receive great offers from us just send this text:
TXTRS PIZZA to 368638

Stick the notice somewhere nice and prominent. On a wall behind a counter, in front of the [cash register], on a card on the table, on the menu, on the receipt, on your website, anywhere it can be read by as many people as possible.

Everyone who texts in will be recorded in your SMS software, and presto, you have a database.

And people will text in, put that notice somewhere prominent, you’ll be surprised.

Next on the list is asking people. Seems obvious really but you’ll be surprised at how many either forget this or don’t have the confidence to ask.

If you own a restaurant, ask your diners. If you own a shop, ask everyone who comes in. If you own a hotel, ask everyone who stays over.

You could make it part of the sales patter,

“Thanks for visiting, did you know we send out offers occasionally by SMS...would you like to receive them?”

If you are uncomfortable with this idea try this: don’t think of it like you’re asking for their mobile number, consider you’re doing them a favour, letting them know there are discounts and offers to be had. No one will be upset with you if you are informing them of possible discounts.

Keywords & Shortcodes

Shortcodes and keywords are easier to remember [than long numbers] and hence easier for your customers to text.

An example would be: ’Text “SHOP” to 84433′

The same principles apply, you need to draw people’s attention to the keyword and shortcode. You can do this by asking or advertising.

-Gary Bury, Managing Director at Mediaburst Limited — A UK based mobile marketing provider.

Mobile apps a $3.8 billion biz in 2011

The apps people buy on their mobile phones continue to bring in big business, and there are few signs of it slowing down according to IHS iSuppli.

In a report released May 3, the research firm says revenue from app stores owned by Apple, Google, Nokia, and Research In Motion is set to grow 77.7 percent, reaching $3.8 billion by the end of the year and eventually rising to $8.3 billion in 2014. By comparison, 2010's mobile app store combined revenues stood at $2.1 billion, up from $830.6 million in 2009.

"With consumers continuing to show robust, unflagging interest in downloading games and other applications to devices like smart phones and tablets, collective revenues from the four stores will climb sharply this year," IHS mobile analyst Jack Kent said in a statement.

IHS iSuppli picked Apple as the frontrunner among the four companies, pulling in $2.91 billion in revenue from the App Store by the end of the year--what it calls "a gargantuan three-quarters share of the total market." That information is based on the IHS iSuppli's own research and estimates, which also call for Apple to drop down to a 60 percent market share in 2014.

That decrease is attributed to Google's Android Market, which IHS iSupply estimates as grabbing $425.36 million in revenue and growing 295.4 percent in 2011. That jibes with sentiments from research group Distimo, which last week estimated that Google would catch up to Apple in terms of app volume and go on to outpace it by July, potentially bringing in more app sales.

-Josh Lowensohn

Groupon Sees Half of All Sales Coming From Mobile in Two Years

SharePrint Mobile, along with social and local, will be one of the largest drivers for Groupon’s deals business over the next few years.

Groupon VP Mobile Partnerships Michael Shim said: “Mobile is huge for Groupon…I believe we could see us doing 50 percent of deals sold/purchased in the next couple of years.”

Shim made the statements this morning at Mobile Northwest, an all-day event in Seattle sponsored by Miller Nash, where a good portion of the day’s discussions are focused on the intersection of mobile and commerce and payments.

The opening morning keynote was delivered by K.C. MacLaren, Starbucks’ director of mobile and emerging platforms. MacLaren said the coffee retailer is the largest mobile payments company, with 8,000 outlets. In January, it rolled out an iPhone app nationwide that allows people to scan their phone to pay for a drink.

MacLaren said so far usage of the application has exceeded expectations, with millions of users. Three months after the app launched, the company revealed that more than three million people had paid using Starbucks Card Mobile.

Right now the application isn’t about incremental revenue, he said, but about driving loyalty. Other iterations in the pipeline include an Android application and the ability to order a coffee for pick-up in the store.

Shim talked about a new service launched last Tuesday called Groupon Now, which allows users in the Chicago area to make a timely purchase decision on when and where they want to eat lunch or dinner–or maybe even go see a movie.

Shim said the service has also exceeded expectations, with more than 1,000 merchants already signed up to offer real-time deals. “We’ve been inundated with demand. Groupon Now is about local discovery. What can I find around me?…We are just getting going on where we think it will take our business.”

-Tricia Duryee

Payment Alliance International First to Market with ATM Mobile Marketing

Payment Alliance International (PAI), a leader in electronic payment processing solutions, announced today that it has integrated mobile marketing into its ATMs. The integration was made possible through an industry-leading partnership between PAI and Street Savings, a mobile marketing provider.

Street Savings mobile marketing products move value using text messaging, popular gift and loyalty programs, and widely available credit card terminal and POS hardware that now includes ATMs. The company’s Mobile Coupons and Mobile Rewards products are designed specifically for resellers. “Our products are easy and affordable for merchants, quick-to-provision and work with the credit card terminals and point-of-sale (POS) systems agents already sell,” said Pal Flagg, Street Savings chief operating officer. “Now they are also the first way for consumers to participate in the benefits of mobile marketing via the ubiquitous ATM.”

PAI manages over 50,000 ATMs nationwide via a network of agents and market representatives. The strategic move enables consumers to opt-in to mobile deals from area merchants at the ATM, and uniquely positions the company and its agents to take advantage of the fast-growing mobile opportunity. “By combining mobile with the ATM, we are giving agents a unique, value-added service that provides differentiation when competing for electronic payment services and ATM sales," said John J. Leehy, III, president & chief executive officer of PAI. “We’re also giving agents a new product that can cost-effectively drive significant revenue for merchants.”

PAI will feature PAIMobile along with its new ATM mobile marketing capabilities at the Electronic Transactions Association (ETA) Annual Meeting & Expo, May 10-12, 2011, in San Diego, Calif. Mobilized ATMs will be available for demonstration at the PAI booth. The demos will highlight the easy accessibility of mobile marketing’s benefits for small- to medium-sized businesses.

At the conference, ETA attendees will have the opportunity to receive mobile text message offers from restaurants and merchants in San Diego’s famous Gaslamp Quarter, such as Get $10 off, simply by opting-in at one of the ATM kiosks on display.

-Business Wire

Visa Says Major Global Mobile E-Commerce Strategy to be Announced This Month

Credit card giant Visa is hinting at a major mobile commerce announcement later this month.

On Thursday, Visa informed the Wall Street Journal that it’s poised to raise the curtain on its global mobile e-commerce strategy in a matter of weeks, if not sooner.

Chief Executive Joseph Saunders first hinted at the looming announcement during an investors call with analysts after Visa reported its fiscal second-quarter results.

The news comes just days after Visa announced an investment of an undisclosed amount into mobile payments provider Square.

-Mobile Marketing Watch

Shop Text To Buy

Impulse-driven online shoppers know the joys of want-click-get more than most. But Will Robison — New York-based creator of text-to-buy virtual marketplace Subports — had the hunch to take the process offline and directly into shoppers' cell phones.

Subports' mobile model has two-fold retail appeal: Sellers (see: Brooklyn-based stylist Christian Joy) have the opportunity to customize orders and drop-ship goods without the burden of mass production and otherwise inevitable overstock. Meanwhile, shoppers can shop product-coded goods wherever they happen to find them — from pop-up shops to gallery openings and concerts — with just the click of a few phone keys.

-NBC Connecticut, Amanda Martinez, The Feast

Opportunities in targeting and engagement to attract new mobile advertisers

Small publishers dominate the growing mobile advertising market but several trends are helping to attract more and larger brands into the space, according to a new report on mobile advertising from The 451 Group.

The “State of the Market: Mobile Display and Search Advertising” report points to the growth of smartphones and the resulting opportunities for targeted advertising and better engagement as leading reasons why brands are showing interest in mobile advertising.

“Brands with large campaign budgets often end up spending a tiny fraction of their budgets on mobile,” states the report from The 451 Group, New York. “What they do not realize is that mobile is not just another channel but a convergence tool owing to its multimedia and contextual capabilities.

“Smaller businesses with limited budgets have a much bigger need for these kinds of unified campaigns, which give them a single, integrated view,” he said.

The shift towards better mobile browsers, faster mobile Internet speeds and tablets are causing brands to consider richer and more engaging advertising formats than SMS and MMS. These include advertising on mobile Web sites, mobile apps and via digital publications.

Display advertising gains traction
Display advertising is showing significant growth, per the report, prompting device manufacturers and carriers, publishing and service delivery platforms to take a closer look at mobile advertising.

The relative reach for some of the largest ad networks has grown significantly in the past year. AdMob is tracking 150 million unique visitors per month in 2010 compared with less than 90 million in 2009.

Inmobi’s monthly unique visitors jumped from a few million in 2009 to over 90 million in 2010. Jumptap, Millennial Media and Mojiva also all saw significant increases.

Looking ahead, location-based ad networks stand to gain from the interest in mobile advertising.

The cost of location-based advertising is several times higher than typical mobile advertising. This has to do with the fact that location can make a big difference to the relevancy of the ad served. Location-based ad networks use this to offer sponsored search results, placements on maps and click-to-navigation features.

“At the moment, [location-based advertising] is a relatively small piece of the overall mobile advertising ecosystem, but with growing realization and interest, these networks will hugely benefit,” the report states.

The effective cost per thousand impressions for mobile advertising can range between $0.30 to as high as $40, per the report.

Complexity hinders growth
There are several factors, however, that stand in the way of some brands embracing mobile.

One is the growing complexity of the industry. There are an estimated 200 mobile advertising networks, including independent ad networks, proprietary ad networks, location-based ad networks, video ad networks and affiliate ad networks, per the report. In addition, there are publishers and developers and ad-creation platforms.

There is also hesitancy on the part of brands to spend in the mobile space because of a lack of independent mobile-specific analytics. However, given the amount of money at stake, several third-party mobile analytics providers are looking to serve the market.

-Chantal Tode

Apple iPad Still The Tablet Leader; Tablet Use Eats Into Other Device Usage

A few stats and numbers released today underscore the dominance that the Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) iPad has among those that have purchased media tablets to date. They also show that tablets use is, as suspected, encroaching on time spent on other devices. That gives another strong reason for why companies like Acer and Sony (NYSE: SNE) see tablets as a must in their product portfolios.

The research, from Nielsen, found that despite strong competition from Android-based devices like the Samsung Galaxy Tab and Motorola’s Xoom, iPad has conceded relatively little market share so far. Some 82 percent of tablet-owners said they owned an iPad.

The research was conducted in spring 2011, says Nielsen. Other findings:

—Single users outnumber sharing users: Unlike the quintessential “family computer”, households are reporting more single-user devices (50 percent) than they are devices that are shared among more than one person (43 percent). Some eight percent of respondents said they owned a tablet, but it was used by others in the house. (Eager children/hopeful but luddite parents?)

—Use of other devices being impacted: Nielsen’s findings seem to confirm the suspicion that the rise of tablets will affect usage of other devices.

Among laptop owners, 32 percent say they are using them less or not at all; among desktop PC owners, the number is even higher, at 35 percent. e-Readers are not immune, either: 27 percent report using those devices less or not at all, while 25 percent of portable games device owners said they were using those devices less, too.

-paidcontent.org

Mobile Marketing Strategy - Include Mobile Web, Apps & Unlimited SMS Text Messaging

EDITOR'S NOTE: It is interesting that this article is focusing solely on Apps and the mobile Web, and did not even touch on SMS messaging! SMS text messaging is accessible to 95% of the market's cell phones. Only AdKing.com offers Free, Unlimited SMS text messaging. No per text fees, ever!

SAN FRANCISCO – A Forrester analyst at Mobile Shopping Summit said that both applications and the mobile Web are key for retailers and brands. However, a single application does not make a mobile strategy.

During the “Consumer Insight: Defining The When, Where And How of Mobile Interaction” session, the executive discussed emerging mobile trends. Additionally, she talked about how more consumers are turning to their mobile device to shop.

“Consumer spending is increasing and with it ad spend and investment in mobile services,” said Julie Ask, vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research, Cambridge, MA.

“Consumers are spending more money on mobile and the ROI is more tangible,” she said. “The level of engagement is going up.

“The bigger opportunity is going to be in sales that mobile will influence in the bricks and mortars.”


Purchase intent
According to Ms. Ask, mobile shopping does not necessarily have to involve a consumer purchase.

In addition to buying products via their mobile device, consumers can also research items before they go into a store.

“Mobile shopping is something that’s more broad than just a purchase,” Ms. Ask said. “Certainly, as you’re going forward, you have to balance mobile commerce versus something like driving traffic.

“A minority of consumers use mobile services today – 8 percent were doing research via mobile and four percent were buying via mobile,” she said. “With smartphone users, that number is significantly more.

“One of the things that surprised me is the phenomenal growth of consumers becoming accustomed to mobile shopping – using the phone in-store has grown a lot.”

Strategy
The mobile Web is still the primary means of consumers using it today, per Ms. Ask.

Although mobile applications are very popular among companies and consumers, Ms. Ask said that just because a company has a mobile app does not mean that it has a complete mobile strategy.

“The iPad has emerged as the shiny new object and there’s certainly an opportunity with it, however a single iPad app isn’t a strategy,” Ms. Ask said.

According to Ms. Ask, mobile shopping should offer three core benefits to drive convenience – immediacy, simplicity and context.

“Phones are very personal and intimate devices,” Ms. Ask said. “You have to make it easy for consumers to input information.

“I believe we’re going to willingly give up information about ourselves because we’re going to want the convenience of what mobile gives us in return,” she said. “You need to focus on customer needs.

“We’re not doing mobile for the sake of doing mobile.”

Mobile is a perfect tool that companies can leverage to engage consumers and get that point of sale.

Consumers always have their devices on them and use them for not only researching a product, but also buying on spontaneously.

“Mobile is as much a product as it is a channel,” Ms. Ask said. “Phones are with us 24/7.

“Shopping is not going to end with a sale,” she said. “It’s going to continue throughout product ownership or service experience.

“It’s important to find out who your target audience is and go from there.”

-Rimma Kats

Smartphones Remaking the Way Men Work and Live

Smartphones are getting men to do what their women have unsuccessfully tried for years: use a map and make them feel more confident. Those are some of the ways that smartphones are remaking the lives of its male users, according to a new survey from Spike TV. The study found that men are unabashedly in love with their smartphones, a borderline addictive relationship that has empowered and also distracted men in small and profound ways.

First, let’s establish that women are huge smartphone users as well. In fact, Nielsen recently said 55 percent of smartphone users age 15-24 are female. And in many ways, smartphones are used similarly by both genders, because they’re such powerful versatile tools. But it’s still fun and interesting to see how Spike TV sized up the male smartphone audience and how these users come to look at their relationship with their gadgets. It says as much about guys as it does about the technology.

The survey of 1,018 men found 88 percent of men said they “loved” their smartphone, with half saying they were actually addicted to their handset. Eight out of 10 said smartphones made their lives better, making them more confident (73 percent) and making them feel smarter (68 percent). That guys could actually find such a boost from gadget suggests smartphones are powerful, but that men are also in need of some ego-massaging and other affirmations. However, it seems like guys do have a different sense of how gadgets make them feel. A recent Retrevo study found that half of men were attracted to a person using a cool phone.

Because of smartphones, 72 percent of respondents said they were using maps and GPS more often, and another 72 percent said they were communicating more with friends. I’m sure women are also doing more of these activities too. But this kind of plays on the guy stereotypes of unfeeling cavemen, eschewing the need to turn to maps or picking up a phone to call a friend. The smartphone is now becoming the more acceptable or easier way to do these certain things for men, it seems. Wives and girlfriends, take note: Guys are more likely to do something when you wrap it up in a cool gadget.

We need to spend more time figuring out the particular nuances in the ways that men and women relate to their phones. There is a deep relationship happening between consumers and their phones, and we’re still learning about how powerful and moving these bonds can be. As the study points out, getting a better fix on how men use their phones can provide a lot of opportunities for marketers, retailers and content creators to tailor their outreach to this audience.

-Ryan Kim